because the progressive tax rates, they encourage all sorts of tax evasion tax be avoidance and you know, they alter people's behavior in order to reduce their tax liability. so you know instead of investing here, you'll invest in some other country with a lower tax rate. you've had those kind of behaviors which would be narrow and progressive tax rates. hence, the money that you raise at the end of the day is not very much. >> eliot: you raise and sharpen our focus on the other side of the equation. as i was reading the article i said wait a minute, we're focusing so much on how we raise the money rather than how and where we spend it. and how much we spend. in a way we've been sucked into this debate about making a tax system progressive without looking as you say we should at how much we spend on the social programs that actually do redistribute. >> that's right. that's what really makes a difference. if you look at how effective taxes are at reducing inequality, they're really not very effective anywhere. what's really effective is spending. because you know, you can really -- if you